Why The Silence From The Sponsors Of The Superior Full Medicare for All?

With the Tea Partiers relentless attacks on each of the troubles besetting Obamacare since its complicated, computer glitch-ridden startup on October 1, 2013, the compelling question is: Why aren’t the Congressional sponsors of H.R. 676 – full Medicare for all with free choice of physician and hospital – speaking out as strongly on behalf of this far superior universal health care coverage?

There are fifty-one members of the House who openly favor the single-payer solution for many good reasons. Legislators behind H.R. 676, such as Reps. Robert Brady (D-PA), Michael Capuano (D-MA), Donna Christensen (D-VI), Judy Chu (D-CA), Yvette Clarke (D-NY), Wm. Lacy Clay (D-MO), Steve Cohen (D-TN), Elijah Cummings (D-MD) and Danny Davis (D-IL) know that single-payer insurance with private delivery is by far more efficient, saving $400 billion a year just on administrative simplification.

Physician, scholar and advocate, Steffie Woolhandler, co-founder of Physicians for a National Health Program (PNHP) says that, “complexity is baked into Obamacare.” What does “complexity” mean beyond thousands of pages of legislation and many more pages of regulations? Over forty years ago, Canada’s single-payer system was enacted with a 13 page bill that covers everyone for less than half of the cost per capita than the U.S.’s waste-ridden, profiteering, corrupt medical-industrial complex that drives honest practitioners up the wall. And, the Canadian system produces better health outcomes at this reduced cost.

Unfortunately complexity means endless opportunities for insurance companies to game the system with fine print, tricks, confusing pricing and lobbying to get out of requirements and standards through waivers. Complexity means ongoing confusion for consumers and patients who go into these exchanges, either because they’ve been thrown out of their existing but substandard insurance policies or do not have any insurance.

Every year, these same consumers have to figure out whether their income has changed enough so that they can report any difference to get a higher or lower subsidy.

Moreover, the public insurance option – Obama dropped that even before he was elected, anxious to not antagonize the powerful insurance companies and their allies – is missing. In West Virginia there is only one insurance seller! Other states have either one, two or more companies that will soon begin confusing consumers in different ways.

So far, the young consumers aren’t signing up at anywhere near the number necessary to actuarially balance off the more costly older consumers. The expected signup rate for middle-aged consumers is way behind projections. And the fine print trap doors keep getting discovered week after week.

“enrolled over 20 million people in six months. And because it was a simple system based on Social Security records, you didn’t have hundreds of people programming in the state of Oregon, thousands of different plans, tons of different co-pays, restrictions and deductibles. You had one single payer plan, which is what we need for all Americans to give Americans the choice they want – which is not a choice between insurance company A and insurance company B. They want the choice of any doctor or hospital like you got with traditional Medicare.”

All the co-sponsors, including the lead sponsor, Cong. John Conyers (D-MI), know that the great majority of the American people, as well as the majority of physicians and nurses prefer the single-payer, full Medicare – everybody in, nobody out – system. Most doctors want to practice medicine, not bookkeeping with page after page of computerized bills loaded with hospital overcharges and code manipulations. Most Canadians never see a bill.

Other co-sponsors of H.R. 676 know how much fraud is concealed in these complex, inscrutable bills that people and insurers receive. The leading expert on health care billing fraud and abuse, Harvard’s Malcolm Sparrow (author ofLicense to Steal), conservatively estimates that 10 percent of all health care expenditure is drained away by billing fraud. That’s over $270 billion this year!

Additional co-sponsors of H.R. 676 including Reps. Henry Johnson (D-GA), Barbara Lee (D-CA), John Lewis (D-GA), Zoe Lofgren (D-CA), Alan Lowenthal (D-CA), Carolyn Maloney (D-NY) and Jim McDermott (D-WA), like their colleagues, know that 45,000 Americans (according to a Harvard Medical School peer reviewed study) die every year because they cannot afford health insurance to get diagnosed and treated in time. Nobody dies in Canada, Germany, France, Sweden, Italy and other western countries due to no insurance; because everybody is insured from the moment they are born at half the per capita cost of that in the U.S.

All the co-sponsors, including Reps George Miller (D-CA), Gwen Moore (D-WI) Jerrold Nadler (D-NY), Richard Nolan (D-MN), Eleanor Holmes Norton (D-DC), Chellie Pingree (D-ME), Mark Pocan (D-WI), Charles Rangel (D-NY), Lucille Roybal-Allard (D-CA), Bobby Rush (D-IL), Linda Sanchez (D-CA), Loretta Sanchez (D-CA) and Janice Schakowsky (D-IL) know that most of their Democratic colleagues favor single-payer, but have not signed on due to their reluctance to embarrass President Obama (who used to favor single-payer) or their avoidance of lobbying hassles from their contributors for a bill they believe has no chance of passing. How’s that for leadership?

So the spotlight has to shine on the lawmakers who have stood publically for H.R. 676, but have not taken on the Tea Partiers and their corporatist backers with this superior alternative. Consequently, the media just reports on the Tea Partiers vocal opposition and nothing on the silent backers of full Medicare for all.

Around the country, there are groups pressing for full Medicare (visitwww.singlepayeraction.org). This weekend, the Physicians for a National Health Program, (with over 15,000 physician-members) is meeting in Boston to debate whether they should mount an offensive for full Medicare in the midst of the Obamacare imbroglio. Their revered mentor, Dr. Quentin Young, a former Chicago friend of Obama’s, argues in his new autobiography,Everybody In, Nobody Out: Memoirs of a Rebel Without a Pause, why Obamacare is worse than nothing.

Regarding “Why the Silence from Sponsors of a Full Medicare for all,”
(good point, by the way) I have something in mind that trumps even
Medicare for all, which would certainly be a HUGE improvement. Check
this out–a DO-IT-OURSELVES single payer system. I found the Occupy
Sandy response to be inspiring,and use it as a model for something
even bigger. I would like a response, colleagues. Jon

Here is what I suggest, since it is much more viable than trying to
get good legislation through THIS Congress!

Using the roughly $100/month premium for Medicare (deducted from
my Social Security allotment) as the guideline for what is workable,
aim for 1,000,000 people to sign up IN PRINCIPLE, pledging money when
the system is in place. Then, when ready, call in the pledges to be
put into an escrow account (maybe in a foreign bank to avoid potential
seizure by the banksters). This amounts to $100 million per month! As
the money comes in, we hire our OWN physicians and other medical
staff, clerical people, accountants, administrators, and whoever else
is needed. Everyone gets a fair and reasonable salary–no fee for
service routine. Bills are submitted to the accounting department so
medical people can do medical work–all the time!
We focus on preventive medicine,and include “alternative therapies”
such as acupuncture, reflexology, herbal medicines and the like.
(Incidentally, when I had severe sciatica a few decades ago, the one
treatment that gave me about 75% immediate relief was reflexology!)
We treat the whole person rather than symptoms or diseases, and are
vigilant about any fraud or malpractice cases. We joyfully cut the
predatory insurance companies out of the picture and eliminate
governmental red tape while providing excellent service.

If you like it, promote it. I would like to see some response. Jon

Jon

Thanks for the support. It might not have to START as a national plan, but could be incremental, with pilot projects to work out the “bugs.” I would say for the time being , leave Medicare alone. “If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it!” Possibly down the road there could be some sort of merger. Not a priority at this time. This plan wold be to assist people in A) getting truly affordable coverage and B) get people into a system who now have none and cannot afford to get in and are perplexed by the enormous complexity of Obamacare. An important feature is that it is an “opt-in” system. No one is forced into it and there are no “federal mandates” as it is outside their control. This undercuts right wing opposition to “government entitlement programs.” Other comments?